Azerbaijan head coach Aykhan Abbasov attended a press conference after the national team's 1-0 win over Liechtenstein in League D of the UEFA Nations League, played in Vaduz on 13 November.
Fanat.az's correspondent, who travelled to Liechtenstein on a trip organised by AFFA with support from “Misli”, reports that the experienced coach shared his thoughts on the match:
“As we said yesterday, we knew our opponents had taken a point against us in the first match, and we expected them to play with greater confidence here. Once again, we wanted to use the same system, maintain the same compact defence and score early. In fact, we did score early, created dangerous chances in the opening minutes and hit the woodwork more than once. Inevitably, the players were a little hasty and very eager to win. That hindered us somewhat, and we could not finish our attacks with complete composure. But most importantly, we had set ourselves a target in this competition: we wanted to finish first. Even if League D is not held in future seasons, earning promotion to League C was very important to us. I thank the players for focusing on the national team and winning this match at a time when the domestic league is so intense and stressful. We still have a friendly against Andorra ahead of us. We will try to give everyone an opportunity in that match, because the players who have recently joined the squad also need to experience the national team atmosphere. We always carry out an analysis after every match. I think we should have won the game in Lithuania as well. The team played really well there and we had clear-cut chances. If we look at the national team's matches, we rarely face a settled defence, as our opponents are usually stronger than us. For example, much of the match against Lithuania was played in midfield, with both sides attacking. Although we made the attacking moves we wanted in an effort to break down a compact defence, the final passes and finishing were lacking. I put that down mainly to the psychological pressure on the players. There is a silver lining to everything. Before the competition began, our goal was to finish top of the group and qualify for League C. The play-off route only emerged later, and that is how things have worked out. When we started the FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) Series tournament in March, I told the team we should try to go unbeaten this year, because the opposition were at our level. Unfortunately, we lost only to Malta. It is pleasing that we did not leave the pitch beaten today. We had plenty of good players on the bench. It was simply that, after bringing on Rufat Abdullazada, we saw the attacks we had planned beginning to develop and decided to wait a little. There is always a question over how a substitute will adapt to the rhythm of the game. Later, seeing that both Rufat and Toral were tiring, we brought on Khayal and Tellur. The game was being played mainly in the opposition half, and we needed incisive shooting. Toral strikes the ball well, while Rufat delivers dangerous crosses from out wide, so we did not want to take them off early. All our decisions were based solely on those factors. Pressing in the opposition half was the foundation of our game plan today. We aimed to win the ball back immediately after losing it, and the players carried that out almost to perfection. There was just one shot at our goal late in the match. The players had been instructed to stop the opposition's dangerous counter-attacks, particularly their number seven, who looked very quick in the first half. We knew how Liechtenstein had battled against Lithuania at home; their main aim was to avoid conceding. That is why we tried to break down their defence and score early from the opening minutes. After watching the match footage, we will have our analysis and points of criticism. Even in a game we win, criticism is inevitable. For example, it took two days to analyse our home win over Lithuania; we made a lot of mistakes. Some players were not even called up for this training camp because they had performed poorly in that match. We want healthy competition, desire and a strong sense of responsibility in the national team. After watching the match again, we will raise our concerns, and the main criticism will be our failure to finish attacks with accurate shots. As for Emil Balayev's yellow card, I do not think that situation warranted a booking. Some of the referee's decisions were difficult to understand. In fact, under the rules, a certain number of seconds should be counted for putting the ball back into play. It is the end of the match; we cannot demand that the goalkeeper hurry in the 96th minute. It is a natural instinct for a player, dictated by the way the game is unfolding.”
Fanat.az
This article was translated from Azerbaijani with the help of AI. Original in Azerbaijani
